


Strange Poison

by Stiletto



Category: Chronicles of Amber - Roger Zelazny, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Narcissa isn't all bad, Other, Takes place the summer before Half Blood Prince, very mild crossover - mostly Harry Potter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-03 21:19:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 19,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10975548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stiletto/pseuds/Stiletto
Summary: A mysterious patient, the adopted daughter of Nicolas Flamel, turns up poisoned at St. Mungo's. If she didn't look so very much like Lucius Malfoy's dead twin, no one would care; but with Lucius in prison and a Wizard War coming... Diana Couerdelion is the last thing anyone needs.I don't own Harry Potter, nor Chronicles of Amber. I'm not making any money from this.





	1. The End of the Innocence

Cory floated to the top of a hot, black pain, opening her eyes with a groan.  The last thing she remembered was the giant stinger coming at her.  Her joints burned, and her blood felt like acid pumping through her veins.  She forced her eyelids up. 

Bleys’s face, uncharacteristically serious, floated into focus.  His smile was strained, his gloved hand on her hair a soothing caress.  “Nice of you to join us.”  The quip was unexpectedly gentle. 

“Hurts.”  A small whimper slipped out around the word before she could clamp down on it. 

“You took a pretty nasty dose of Manticore poison.”  He put a vial to her lips, and tipped the contents into her mouth.  Swallowing made white-hot razors dance in her throat. 

As her eyes focused more solidly, she could see a pleasant hospital room that was not a normal hospital.  There were no monitors.  There were curtains in the window. Cory’s eyelids turned traitor and pulled her down, back into oblivion.

The next time she woke, Bleys was still sitting by her bed.  She ached horribly, but it was not the every-fiber cross-eyed scream of nerves anymore.  Slowly, a minute or two at a time, she came to understand that she was now recovering.  They gave her few reassuring words, a sip or two of water, then someone in gloves, Bleys or a nurse, would give her a draught of something that eased her back into painless darkness.  Gradually, slowly, the pain faded.

When the day came that she woke up fully, and with only a low residual ache in her joints, Bleys was still sitting in the chair by her bed.  A round-faced boy sat across a chessboard from him.  Bleys watched the child consider the board with carefully contained amusement and pleasure.  It looked entirely familiar.  Cory had been that child, once.  She remembered Bleys' coaching, patient and teasing.  The boy muttered something, and one of his pawns stepped itself up and demolished Bleys' castle, sending tiny rubble skittering across the board.

Bleys praised his opponent.  “Now I have to make a sacrifice that’s bigger than yours.  If I let that pawn stay there, I’d be in trouble.  I’ll lose two major pieces to your one pawn.  Excellent.”  His rook obliterated the pawn, which would allow the boy’s queen to take the rook.  Bleys was in no danger of losing the game, but he was letting the kid feel good about the loss.

“Queen to F6?” suggested Cory to the boy.

The boy jumped slightly, pinkening.

“You stay out of this,” Bleys chastised her with a grin.  “Neville, this is my ward, Diana Coeurdeleon.  Diana, Neville.”

Cory took her cue.  Diana.  Not using real names.  Check.  “Nice to meet you, Neville.”

“Yes,” agreed Neville, flustered.  “I should go, Mr. Flamel.  Gran will be back by now.  Nice to meet you, Miss Coeurdeleon.”  Neville fled the room.

“That kid needs a serious dose of self-esteem,” said Bleys when the door had closed.  “You must feel better, to be butting in on my game.”

"Where is this?" she asked.

"Saint Mungos."

Cory's blood ran cold.  If he’d brought her back, after twenty-five years of keeping her away from this world, it must have been life or death.

“When can I go home?” she asked, wanting her own room, wanting the glimpse of the harbor and the sparkle of the sea.

Bleys smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes.  “We have a dilemma remaining as regards your health.  Your body isolated the poison instead of metabolizing it.  You’re slowly purging yourself of the stuff through your glands – pores, oil glands, saliva… it doesn’t affect you anymore but it’s extremely toxic to living things other than yourself.  Risk of transfer seems minimal... there's something active about the stuff that it has to actually go person to person by direct contact, but you’re going to be poisonous to the touch until you work it all out of your system.”

“But…”

“It isn’t safe for you to come home yet.  You almost died, Cory, several times.  As it is you’ve been in and out for *months*.  The fact that you’re awake, stable, and not in agony, is a miracle of potion mastery.  You absolutely must not jostle your recovery until you're free of this poison.  You understand?”

“I don't want to stay...” she muttered, feeling less like thirty-six and more like sixteen.

“Look me in the eye, Cory.”

Defiantly, she looked up, blue eyes to blue eyes.  There was no trace of jest or pity in Bleys’s look.

“Do.  You.  Understand.  Me?” He was the only father she’d ever had, and Bleys was rarely this serious. 

Cory deflated, looking away and blinking hard.  “I’ll stay.”

He squeezed her foot through the sheets.  “That’s my girl.  Look at it this way - you’ll have some uninterrupted time to catch up on your art.  I’ve set you up with a bank account… you’re quite wealthy.”

“How long… how long can you stay?” she managed.  Exams made it sound like she was going to be here for a very long time.

“Not much longer, I’m afraid. A day or two. If Random wasn’t as terrified for you as I am, he’d have sent Corwin or Gerard to drag me home. The good news is that your flying monkey doesn’t seem at all affected by your condition.  He’s been sleeping under your ear since you got here, and he seems perfectly healthy.  The Unicorn alone knows why.  We think it’s to do with his particular, peculiar metabolism, or maybe because of his link to you.”

“Jigger’s here?”

On cue, Jigger zipped in through the open window and plunked onto her chest with an enormous green butterfly in his mouth.  He flicked his wings back, and they shriveled up beneath the thick ruff of fur on his shoulders until he looked for all the world like a golden marmoset.  Her muggle friends thought he was one.  Jigger spat out his butterfly, patting her chin and hooting his delight softly at her.

“Thanks,” she whispered brokenly, stroking his soft little head with one finger.  Faithful Jigger.

“I’m going to go up to the tea shop and get you something to eat,” Bleys said.  “Hang tough, kiddo.”

“Right.”

Bleys gave her a smile and a nod.  Then he left so that Cory could cry herself to sleep in private.


	2. Who’s Watching Me

Bleys, known in this place as ‘Nicolas Flamel’, had explained her background to the hospital.  He’d found her on the streets when she was in her early teens (which was the truth), and though she was a ‘squib’ she was his adopted daughter.  He bent a piercing blue eye on the hospital administration until they agreed it entitled her to ongoing care at St. Mungo’s without an _Obliviate_.

Her recovery would be a long-term prospect, the Healers told her.  ‘How long’, Cory’s burning question, nobody wanted to guess.  They had not detected any significant change in her toxicity level, and that was all they would say.  In other words, they were clueless.  They transferred her to a private room off of Ward 49.  Long term patients.  Her neighbors there were Alice and Frank Longbottom, Agnes the Dog-faced Witch, and a fellow named Lockhart who’d lost his memory and whose chief delight in life was signing autographs.  Alice played gin and several kinds of poker, and in spite of the fact that the only vocal noises she could make were canine, she and Cory got on quite well. Alice and Frank Longbottom were Neville’s parents, reduced to fragility by torture.

At first, there was a concern that Jigger’s fur would cross-contaminate those around his mistress, but he didn’t seem to pass the poison on.

“Where did you come by him, Miss Courdeleon?” asked Healer Biggs.

“My uncle made him for me.”

“Some kind of homunculus?  Well, that explains it’s somewhat erratic quality of nullifying the poison, and if anyone could make a creature, it would be Mister Flamel.”

In the next few weeks Cory acquainted herself with the world via every magazine and newspaper the staff would bring her.  The colleague that Bleys had consulted to find a cure for her was mentioned several times in the newspapers.  Albus Dumbledore was an influential figure, and Headmaster of a prominent school for wizards and witches.

Neville Longbottom brought her a very weird plant in a pot the size of a shallow helmet.  It had three beautiful open blooms and looked like a cross between a bonsai tree, an orchid, and a flytrap, and Cory told him so. 

“It’s a Poison Trap,” said Neville softly.  “They grow under Poisonwood trees in the Caribbean, and they mostly catch bugs.  They can digest just about anything organic.  They’re healthiest if they’re fertilized with… well, it’ll do best if you wipe the leaves now and then with your hands.  If it starts to get sick, you’ll know you’re getting better.”

Something besides Jigger that she couldn’t kill.  Cory blinked at the sudden glass of tears of her eyes.  Neville looked stricken.  Cory pulled herself together.  “Thank you,” she said with a shaky smile.  “This may be the most thoughtful present I’ve ever gotten.”

Jigger adored Neville.  Cory found herself admiring the strength of heart the lad must possess to come, week after week to see parents that did not know him, and whom he did not remember.  He had been very small when their minds were broken.  His grandmother made no bones about his lack of magical brilliance.  In her eyes, he would never be good enough to come out of his parents’ shadows.  Every week, he walked into his own nightmare out of sheer loyalty. 

Then school started, and Neville went away, though he promised to write regularly.  By now, Cory knew him to be good to his word.  The prospect of letters was cheering.  Particularly in the long hours of the night when she couldn’t sleep.  The Healers were kind, leaving her plenty of ‘Dreamless Sleep’ draughts, but Cory didn’t feel as if she needed more sleep, so she poured the potions down the sink and found other ways to occupy her time. 

***

Cory’s face was only an inch from the painting’s surface when an occupant slipped into it.

“Well hello, dearie,” said Dilys Derwnt, startling a moment.  “Can’t sleep?” she asked.

"Sleep schedule is completely tossed,” Cory admitted.  “They keep telling me it’ll settle down, but at this point what they don’t know about me would apparently fill barrels.  This brushwork is very nice,” she said.  “And now that you’re here, your hair is beautifully rendered.  Would it be rude to ask if you remember being painted?”

“Not rude in any way, but I’m afraid I don’t remember.”

“Do you know the things that your… three dimensional self knew?  Like, about poisons?”

“Yes, though medical knowledge has moved on since my time.  I take it from your question that you’re the chronic toxicity patient?  The one they used the Rappachinni potion on?”

“Diana Coeurdeleon, but friends call me Cory.  Um, what should I call you?”

“Well, if we’re on a first name basis, Dilys.”

“It’s lovely to meet you, Dilys.”

“And you, dearie.  How long are you going to be here?”

“Don’t know.  They won’t predict. My condition is listed as ‘stable’, but I have to be in a ‘controlled environment’.  I’d have to have a sponsor to get out.”

“Yes, well, one wouldn’t really call the Rappachinni potion a ‘cure’ so much as it is an alternative kind of poison.  What about your guardian, Nicolas?  Can’t he get you a day pass?  Such a dear man. We all assumed he was dead.”

“He’s not able to stay in one place at the moment.”

“Ah.”

“They tell me you can go into most paintings in the building and to wherever there’s a painting of you?” asked Cory.  “That seems quite useful; unless your other paintings are in storage.  Though you’d have one at Hogwarts School, I suppose.  It’s on your plaque that you were a Headmistress there.”

“That’s right, dear.  Albus Dumbledore is Headmaster there now.  I believe he worked with your guardian at one time.”

“Nicolas holds him in very high regard, I know.  I believe that Master Dumbledore found the cure that saved my life.”

“Dumbledore knew someone, I think,” said Dilys vaguely.

Whether she meant it to be a hint or not, Cory took it as one and politely changed the subject. “So, was your portrait done when you were alive?”

“Yes, but until my body died I wasn’t as aware. I believe paintings from whole cloth imagination are aware from the start.”

Over the ensuing nights, Cory and Dilys spoke often.  There was a fine landscape hanging in Cory’s room, and now that they’d met Dilys came by to chat frequently, and answered questions about wizarding art to the extent of her limited knowledge.  Cory’s trump deck seemed to function without any whiff of variability, but would a trump drawn here have that effect?  What happened if one painted a normal painting of a subject?  Would it be useful as a trump?  Wizard photographs weren’t aware.  Indeed, they seemed to represent a very small section of time, but the differences between a painting, a trump and a photograph were manifold. 

Time was one of the factors that Cory was particularly aware of.  A photo caught a person as they were at an instant.  Painting captured a subject over time.  Most portraits were created over a span of weeks if not months.  Even a very fast trump artist could do nothing more than compress that effect.  Trumps had to capture some soul-deep core that didn’t change.  Wizard photos captured motion, some feeling of the moment they were snapped, but they were not sentient.  Where was the overlap between wizard painting and trump?  Was there overlap?  To experiment, Cory needed art supplies.  Wizarding art supplies.  She didn’t want to take any chances on flue order.  For brushes and paint… Aunt Fiona had taught her to be picky.  Cory needed a day-trip to Diagon Alley.

It required she sign lots of papers and promise on her absolute honor and almost in blood to come back by nightfall.  They also wanted her to swear not to take her gloves off.  It was a small price to pay for a day out of St. Mungo’s.  The Knight Bus took her straight to the Leaky Cauldron.

“Tom,” the bartender introduced himself.  He was bald with no teeth, but he wasn’t wearing a lime green Healer’s coat.  Cory could have kissed him. 

“Diana.”

“Need a room?” he asked.

“Unfortunately, no.  Do you have tea and ice back there?”

“I do.”

“And a glass I can bring back?”

He shook his head.  “I don’t.”

"Then I guess I ought to sit down.”

“Guess so.”

Jigger sat happily peeling and eating grapes while Cory sipped her iced tea.  The tea, poured over ice, was precisely the right strength.  The sprig of mint didn’t so much flavor the tea as add to its scent.  Cory smiled, taking her time with her drink.  It tasted like freedom.  She left her empty glass on the bar with her only pocket money.

Diagon Alley was full of shoppers, people in robes and gowns and all manner of odd dress, all coming and going.  It was almost like a city street in Amber.  Jigger rode her shoulder, little fingers resting on her ear, his other small ‘hand’ gripping the fabric of her borrowed robes.  ‘Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions’ seemed like the answer to the dilemma of scrubs and borrowed clothes.  Cory stopped into Gringott’s, consulted with their financial planning department, disconcerted the goblin guide by laughing and shrieking through the roller-coaster track system in their vaults, and emerged prepared for serious shopping.  When Bleys said he’d left her here rich, he wasn’t joking around.

Madam Malkin listened attentively to Cory’s explanation of her skin condition.  “Well, the things they can do these days. Pick some robes out, put them on, and I’ll do the tailoring with them on you.  You won’t need to take them off again.”

“Perfect.”

Cory’s choice of attire was a robe the dark purple-gray of a black pearl, trimmed in ebony.  It fitted through the waist and swirled into fullness around her feet.  Long bell sleeves revealed the graceful gathering of a pale lavender shirt into smooth, pearl-buttoned cuffs.  Another flash of the pale shirt showed at her throat.  Under the robe, she also wore a brocade waistcoat, a pair of truly superb buttoned black ankle boots and black trousers.  Madam Malkin swished everything into a perfect fit in under an hour.  Smooth, kid leather gloves in black completed the attire.  An enchantment gave her the same sensation with the gloves that she’d have had with bare fingers.

Smartly attired, with the borrowed robes and hateful latex gloves sealed up and dispatched by owl back to St. Mungo’s, she strolled down the Diagon Alley.  Twice she thought she felt someone watching her, but couldn’t catch sight of who was doing it.  She didn’t notice any one person repeatedly in her line of sight. 

Next to ‘Quality Quiddich Supplies’ was a small stationer’s store.  They supplied a portfolio case, a stack of illustration board, sketchbooks, a selection of solid-block inks, brushes and pens.  At Flourish and Blotts she discovered an old recipe book for hand-mixed paint and pigments.  The junk store yielded up a mortar and pestle, and assorted small jars for water and mixing.

Back out on the street, Cory strolled and looked in windows.  Jigger chirred in her ear, patting the corner of her jaw.  Cory stroked his chest absently.

“Spotted our tail, did you?”

Jigger chirruped an affirmative.  It took a little maneuvering to lose the person.  Cory never did figure out who it was, but Jigger definitely had the person pegged.  It was like the old days, losing the Amber City Guard, though this time she had Jigger to help.  This was a smaller space, however, and much more challenging for that fact.  Nonetheless, Cory ducked out the back door of a magical pet store and into the dark, and Jigger gurgled happily when, ten minutes later, he still had not detected their follower.

Cory sat down on a bench in a narrow passage that led off of Diagon Alley.  The furtive way that the people darted up and down, either looking down or watching for prey, told Cory that this wasn’t what Aunt Fi would call ‘the right side of the tracks’.  Being out in the light hadn’t kept her from being watched.  Maybe in the dark she could at least think unmolested.  Why the blazes was she being followed, and by whom?  Speaking of blazes, maybe it was some enemy of Bleys’?  Well, there was one way to find out.  She took out Bleys’ trump.

“How’s my girl?” he greeted her warmly. From the wall behind him, and his velvet doublet, he was at some sort of formal event in a house that could afford wallpaper with real gold foil. “Not in hospital, I see… unless that’s the coal cellar.”

“They gave me a day out for good behavior.  Do you have some kind of enemies here?’

“None that you should be seeing, why?”

“Somebody’s following me, that’s all.  I wanted to make sure it wasn’t someone going to put a knife in my back.”

“Probably the Ministry of Magic.  They're likely irritated that I hadn't coughed it in like a good boy, and that I didn’t give them any explanations about you.”

“What did they want to know?”

“Who your parents were, ironically.  I don’t think they believed me when I pled ignorance.”

“That’s because you lie so well they don’t know the difference,” she said fondly, and earned one of Bleys’ sparkling grins.  “Okay, well thank you.  Enjoy your party.”

“Do you… “

“No help, thank you.  I was complaining to myself about being bored… and this is, at least, interesting.”

Bleys laughed.  “You’re quite a piece of work, you know that?”

“Being the finish carpenter, you’d know,” she jibed back with a fond grin.

She blew him a kiss, they said good-bye, and Cordelia was left to her puzzle.


	3. Turn of a Friendly Card

Screams brought Cory to her feet.  People rushed past, fleeing… something.  Down the alley, a black, ragged form hovered over a woman between it and Cory.  The woman was turning to run.  Too slowly.

Cory didn’t think.  She snatched a bottle of ink out of her bag and hurled it at the thing.  The inkwell shot past the woman’s ear and impacted the creature’s chest.  The woman threw herself to one side.  The heavy glass smashed and splattered ink on the horror’s tattered robes.  Black on black.  The creature raised its cowled head.  There wasn’t a face under it, but its attention clearly came to rest on Cory.  Cold swept over her.

_Okay, not so smart._

The thing slid toward her.  If it had human bones, its sternum would’ve been in pieces from the inkwell.  Trump energy could short magic.  Cory dug in her pocket, snatching the top trump out of her card case.  Then it was on her.  Cold.  So cold that it seemed to seep into her very brain.

So cold.  Cory scrabbled in her mind for something, anything to combat to that hopeless cold, something to make her limbs move in spite of the freezing helplessness.  Coins spilled out of her pocket.  Coins.  Coins falling into a man’s shaking hand.  The card chilled in her fingers.  Vaguely, she heard a voice, but all she knew was that there was a charged card in her hand, an edge of power.  With a scream of rage, Cory extended out of her crouch at the creature, pushing hard with her legs, letting the strength gather through her hips, flow up her torso and down her arm as she slashed the edge of the charged card across the open throat of the black cloak.  Then everything went black.

 

“Dementor.”  “Aurors.” “Ran it off with a card for Merlin’s sake.” 

“Stand away,” commanded a cool, crisp woman’s voice.

The dark forms stood back, and only one figure was left.  Cory flinched away from the hands that took her arms.  “Don’t touch me… poisonous skin,” she croaked.

“Then it’s a good job I wear gloves.  Thank you for the warning.”  The woman’s voice was cool, sophisticated, the words brisk. The hands on Corey’s elbow were trembling.  “You, run up to Fortean’s and fetch some dark chocolate.  Tell him it’s for me, I don’t want his dime store junk.”

Cory’s vision cleared a little.  The woman who had her arm was elegantly dressed in black so severe that it bordered on mourning.  She had clearly cut, delicate features beneath hair slightly more golden Cory’s own.  She slipped an arm around Cory’s back and helped her sit up, careful to avoid Cory’s exposed face.

“Who are you?” asked Cory, picking up her dropped card and checking that the rest of the cards were all still in their case. 

“Narcissa Malfoy.  Careful, now.” 

Malfoy.  Cory knew that name from the papers.  Lucius Malfoy was in Azkaban, or was supposed to be.  An agent of the one they wouldn’t name.  A Deatheater.  He had a son, Draco, and a wife, Narcissa who had been a Black.

Narcissa Black Malfoy was willow-slender.  She looked like a breath would break her in half, but she was strong enough to get Cory back onto the bench she had so recently vacated.  Narcissa drew out a slender, white wood wand.  Two words later, Cory’s new robe and shirt were clean again, the button back on her cuff.  A narrow man with shifty eyes held out a candy bar.

Narcissa opened it, and pressed a piece of chocolate into Cory’s hand.  “It helps the cold feeling,” she explained.

Cory took a cautious nibble.  The sweet richness of it did, indeed, help warm her.  And it was very, very good chocolate.  She took a slightly larger taste.

“Auror coming, Ma’am,” said the narrow man.

“Thank you, Francis.  You’d better go.”

Two men in dark robes strode through the rapidly diminishing crowd.  Aurors.  The magic police.  Funny that after years as royalty, seeing the authorities come toward her still had the power to make Cory’s adrenaline run. Jigger, clinging to Cory’s shoulder still, screeched softly at them.

“Mrs. Malfoy,” said the first, revealing slight surprise.

“Good afternoon, Auror Bellows.  I trust you are not here to conduct this young lady to Azkaban for the crime of being accosted?” asked Narcissa coldly.

“We understand that there was a Dementor that attacked you, miss,” the second Auror said to Cory, apparently to avoid verbal sparring with Narcissa.

“It left,” croaked Cory.  She took a full bite of the chocolate bar.

“Do you have any idea why it attacked you?”

“I threw an ink pot at it.  It was going after some woman… I don’t know who.”

“It was attacking me,” Narcissa told them.  “This young woman interrupted it before it could do damage to me.  It came into the Alley, and I was apparently the first thing it noticed.”

“Is that all?” Auror Bellows asked Cory

“Sorry, sir, I was paying attention to the Dementor.  I tried to defend myself.  Then I fainted.”

“May we go?” Narcissa requested.  “She should be someplace warm.”

The Aurors consulted one another in low tones and Bellows finally said, “Of course.  If you recall anything else, Miss, please contact the Ministry.”

That had taken far less interviewing than Cory thought it should.  Narcissa Malfoy, however, wasted no further time.  She swept Cory up Diagon Alley with fine disregard for the stares of the crowd.  She commanded a private room at the Leaky Cauldron and ordered port to go with their chocolate.

“So,” said Cory, relaxing in an over-stuffed wing chair, “did you arrange this meeting or did someone else?”

Narcissa’s smile was a thing of gleaming beauty.  “An acquaintance at Saint Mungo’s called me when you left there.  I can’t say who called the Dementor.”

“You aren’t saying that was a coincidence, surely?”

“I flatter myself that I was called first, but more than that I don’t know.”

Cory smiled slightly.  “All right, you wanted to see me.  Now that you’ve done it, what do you think?”

“That you are, without doubt, a Malfoy… or the ghost of one.”

“Ask your questions.”

“Beg pardon?”

“You didn’t come to see me personally out of simple desire to study my dramatic profile.”  Kind newspapers in Amber called Cory ‘handsome’.  The rest assessed her aquiline nose as ‘unfashionable’.

Narcissa sipped her wine, as if to cover nervousness.  “Did Lucius try to kill you?”

Cory smiled thinly.  Narcissa didn’t know any more about this than Cory did.  Cory decided to see where understanding would get her.  She understood, for instance, that putting a possible witch or wizard in danger could wake their talents.  Neville had told some very funny, and frightening, stories about his great-uncle.  “Did he?  I understand that instinctive use of magic can be stimulated by placing a slow starter in harm’s way.” 

“Do you bear him ill will?” asked Narcissa.

She’d noticed that Cory hadn’t really said either way, and she wanted something more solid than inference. The lady was quick. “Did he send you to ask, or are you asking?”

“For the moment, let’s say he sent me.”

Cory smiled.  “I suppose it’s comforting, in its way, that you aren’t sure.  You are worried, though, for the family name, of what a squib in the sacred purity of the blood would mean.”

“You still haven’t answered my question.” 

“I like my life, and I’ll react violently to anyone who tries to take it away from me.  Other than that, I don’t care about your husband one way or the other.  Is that enough for you?”

“No, but I can see that it will have to do.  You know, of course, that your pose as a squib won’t last after your stunt with the card?”

“Someone is bound to tell the Aurors and the newspaper that I ran the Dementor off with a tarot card.  I’d say that very soon, thanks to someone with a big mouth and rampant lack of concern for my health, something is about to be aired on the front page of the Daily Prophet.  Wonder if I can get the Quibbler to run it first,” she mused.  “At least then no one will believe it.  No, I think the Potter kid might’ve spoiled that instant disbelief factor.  Drat.”

Narcissa sat silent for a long time.

“Don’t worry, sweetie, I’m not going to ask you to give up the rat.”

She jumped at that.

“Lucius’ friends aren’t talking to you, are they?  Aurors watch you too closely.  What are they going to think now that you befriended me?”

“Stop it!” hissed Narcissa.  Like the threat display of a kitten, brittle and too fierce.  She must be very vulnerable, or she wouldn’t need to make a display.

“Relax, I was guessing.”

Narcissa glared at her. 

Cory felt a little sorry for Narcissa.  Aunt Fiona had done this so many times to Cory, and Cory always hated it.  On the other hand, it was effective.  “So, what will the Deatheaters and their boss think?  They’ll think that you’re watched, and I’m watched, and that your getting close to me is either useful, or treasonous.  The first option is acceptable for you.  The second choice is not.”

“Get out of my mind!”

Cory let her irritation out in a returning snap.  “I am not reading you!  Great Unicorn’s hooves, woman, I don’t have to read your mind to know what you might be thinking.  You’re not irretrievably stupid, I hope, and those are fairly natural questions.”

“Let me know when you can answer them,” said Narcissa, bitter.

Cory passed her the chocolate.  “It won’t cure what ails you, but I can’t think of anything that isn’t better with chocolate.”

“Bell peppers,” offered Narcissa sulkily.

Cory grinned.  “Touché.”

“What will you do?” Narcissa asked, seeming a little mollified.

“Go back to my hospital room like a good girl.  Until I find out whether Lucius was in cahoots with the Dementor-keeper or whether he has over-zealous buddies on the outside, I’m thinking St. Mungo’s sounds like a pretty nice place.”  Cory built a pause.  “If Lucius didn’t ask you to contact me, you could be in danger, being seen with me.”

“If you are his ally, I’m safe.”

“If that’s what you depended on, I’m sorry.”

A trace of tension faded out of Narcissa.

Cory raised an eyebrow.  She turned the conversation over in her mind.  “You’re in a sort of no-man’s land… and you could reason that I am as well, particularly if I was squib.  You came looking for an ally for yourself.”

“I don’t believe it would be best for me to say more,” Narcissa demurred.

“Lady, you are good,” Cory complimented her.  “You must have had near heart-failure when you found out I wasn’t completely magic-less.”

“It was a torn moment,” she admitted.  “It turned out quite well for us both that you weren’t.”

Cory laughed.  “Now if we can just decide whether we can trust one another or not.”

“We have the same dilemma.”

“You clearly don’t want me to read your mind.”

“It’s not the kind of place a potential ally ought to see.”

Cory had seen those eyes before.  Narcissa’s were paler than Cory’s, but the look wasn’t one Cory could miss.  “Did you do it, or was it done to you?”

If she’d jabbed Narcissa with a needle, the woman couldn’t have jumped more violently.  “That isn’t your business.”

“If you’re turning coat and asking me to trust you, it’s my business.  If you’re a victim and you’re taking me as the best available lifeguard, it’s my business.  Hunh, kinda my business either way, isn’t it?”

“What do you suggest?”

“I don’t know.  If I can trust you, and they can’t, that’s pretty damn good for me.”

“Oddly, I have the same issue and the same question.”

“Stand off.  Hate those.  Here’s the deal.  You look me in the eye and tell me that you aren’t friendlying up to me for Lucius or what’s his name and I will be able to tell if you’re lying.  I won’t dig, won’t poke, won’t look for anything else.  If you lie to me, I will know.”  _I hope._

Slowly, Narcissa looked up, met Cory’s eyes.  The delicate features seemed to recede around the glittering, icy hatred in her pale eyes.  “I swear on the life of my son, I am not in league with the Dark Lord or any of his minions, and if I could kill my husband for what he has done to our son, I would.”

The words rang true as crystal.  There was no mistaking hate like that.

“Tell me what you need.”

“I still have to decide whether or not I trust you,” Narcissa pointed out.

“Let me know what you decide.”


	4. Chapter 4: Letters to my Friend

Cory trumped Bleys to assure him she was all right (his had been the card on top, and the one it had turned out she’d used on the Dementor), and caught the Knight Bus back to Saints.

  
Dilys was waiting for Cory’s return in a mural in the front entry of St. Mungo’s. “Are you all right, dear?” she asked anxiously.

  
“No. I’m tired and I’m crabby and I’m hoping there’s a whole pile of parcels to unpack in my room. Would you ask the teashop to send me down a tray, Dilys? Please? And join me?” Cory invited.

  
“Of course, dear.” Dilys whisked off.

  
Cory went up to her room and started to go through her day’s loot. She stood the easel where its contents would get the best light, stacked the canvases against one wall. She was just beginning to lay out her new brushes, paints, and inks on a little folding table when Dilys appeared in the landscape opposite Cory’s bed.

  
“So, you told someone that I was going out?” Cory asked her.

  
“I heard that horrible orderly, Mr. Noakes, speaking to someone by Floo. He was deferential on the first call, and quite disgustingly groveling on the second. I felt sure he intended you no good.”

  
“Yes, well, I managed to lose the original Auror sent to watch me long enough to be attacked, but thank you for the attempt,” said Cory, giving the painted woman a wry smile. The smile faded. “Dilys, did you hear what he was saying?”

  
“No, just your name and the tone of it.”

  
Cory felt a chill wash over her. Someone wanted her watched, but the Dementor had only come after her when she’d attacked it. What if it had been there for Narcissa?

  
“I’m just glad you’re all right. It looks like you had quite the shopping spree. Madam Malkin did your robes, I assume?”

  
“Personally.” Cory smoothed her sleeve in satisfaction. “They are nice, aren’t they? Magical tailoring certainly has its uses. Custom fitting in ten minutes.”  
The ward nurse brought in a rolling tea tray, and Cory poured herself a cup of fragrant tea. “I’m going to paint you a proper tea table,” Cory told Dilys.

  
“That would be lovely,” admitted Dilys, a little wistfully.

  
“I have one sketch I’d like to do, then I’ll get serious.”

  
When she was sure Dilys was gone, probably to report to somebody, Cory sketched a trump of Narcissa Malfoy.

  
Narcissa was sitting in an expensive-looking parlor. “Merlin alive…” she breathed when she frowned and suddenly saw Cory.

  
“There isn’t time to explain. The man who called for the Dementor is the same one who called you. Is there any chance that you were set up? Could it have been in the Alley for you?”

  
Narcissa paled. “It’s possible,” she admitted.

  
“Until we know, we should both act like it was after us. I won’t call you this way again if I can help it. I don’t think his Grossness can trace it, but there’s no point being foolish. Please answer as briefly as you can. Are you safe where you are?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“Stay that way, please,” requested Cory.

  
“I shall.”

  
Cory closed the connection, folded the paper and put it in her trump case. By the time Dilys came back, near midnight, Cory was well into a design for a painting of a teacart in a sunroom. She made the thing a study in light and the way it fell differently through the open doors, the windows, and through the long, sheer curtains. The painting had an almost trump-like feeling. Almost. She worked on it at different times of day, and the painting seemed to pick up that sense of time and change, and obediently presented the sunlight at different angles and shades of dawn or dusk.

  
Mr. Noakes, who had informed Narcissa and some unknown about Cory’s departure from St. Mungo’s, did not return to work. Cory did not ask Dilys about him.

  
Cory continued her painting carefully so that it had night as well as day, and so that she could paint a wash of moonlight in contrast to the warm glow of lamps with stained-glass shades. The hot water pot on the teacart gave off steam at all times of the day or night, ever ready for a guest to walk in. Cory had planned her canvas size very carefully, and when the last paint was dry and the she had put her signature on it, she removed the hospital’s generic landscape from its frame and replaced it with her own painting.

  
“My goodness, dear, you are very, very talented,” said Dilys in pleased surprise, moving about the room. “This is simply beautiful, and these chairs are wonderful, and… oh my, look at the canisters of tea so that I can make any kind I like.” She beamed at Cory. “This is too lovely, my dear, really too lovely. Thank you.”

  
“If I ever get discharged out of here, I’ll take it with me so you can come visit even when I’m gone.”

  
Cory went to work on her next painting, a forest in a storm. Flares of lightning proved far more difficult to achieve than the long hours of a day, but eventually it came together in an impressionist, rough way that suited Cory’s intent. On Friday afternoon, a case of extremely expensive port arrived for Cory. It came with a soft little white owl and a note with a blank seal.

 

_Dear Ms. Coeurdeleon,_

  
_As you will deduce, I have come to a decision. I need you to go to Albus Dumbledore, the Headmaster of Hogwarts School, and beg him, from me, to save my son. I cannot approach Dumbledore in person, it would be far too dangerous for both myself and Draco. If I attempt to persuade Draco away from the Dark Lord, he would only report my ‘treason’, and he would still die. Even if the Dark Lord did not kill Draco, Lucius certainly would. I do not know how he can save Draco, only that if Dumbledore cannot, no one can. The case is complicated by the presence of an enemy spy at the school. Professor Severus Snape, the Head of Slytherin House, is a Deatheater. Dumbledore needs to know that he must not, under any circumstance, trust Snape._

  
_I have been unable to determine who was the target of the Dementor, as my informant has turned up in the hands of the Aurors. I am keeping to heavily shielded locations, and hope that, should you leave St. Mungo’s for any reason, you will take the same precaution._

  
_It will be best for us both if I do not come to see you. To be too close to me will not help your case with the idiots at the Ministry. My influence is small these days, but do not hesitate to contact me if there is any way in which I may covertly assist you. Please accept the port as a token of my gratitude._

  
_Sincerely,_   
_Narcissa_

 

Interesting that she did not sign her last name. It was like signing herself a friend instead of an acquaintance or a simple ally. A few moments after Cory finished reading, the paper burst into flame and destroyed itself. Goblin parchment. Cory'd seen it for sale at Flourish and Blotts. Cory began work on an illuminated letter in the hours that Dilys was elsewhere. Around the edges and through the opening letter she wove a delicate tracery of stylized paper whites that would sprout from their bulbs and form the border as the letter was opened, then bud and bloom as the recipient read the message. The greatest feat was in the contents of the letter. They were a person-specific trump effect that would only appear for Narcissa herself. It was the best Cory could do toward secrecy. She wrote the body of the letter in her most careful lettering. In spite of a “deplorable tendency to scrawl”, Cory was quite capable of producing “a fine, neat hand” when properly motivated. Narcissa Malfoy was not the type of woman who would respect a scrawl.

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

  
_I am flattered that I stand so high in your esteem. It’s a magnificent gift. My only request is that you keep yourself well and safe. I feel even that will be more difficult than it ought. Do what you must. I shall not forget you, and will do what I can as regards Draco._

  
_Cory_

 

She was reasonably pleased with the results of her illumination. The paper whites, narcissus, even smelled beautiful. Cory folded the letter, ensuring the slight overlaps that would make the seal as proof against tampering as could be mundanely managed. She took her cue from Narcissa and left the seal a smooth blank. The owl accepted the letter and launched itself on its errand.

  
Cory paced around her room, then pulled her chair back up to her makeshift desk and laid out a fresh page of vellum.

 

_Albus Dumbledore_   
_Headmaster_   
_Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

_Dear Sir,_

  
_As you are no doubt aware, I have recently become acquainted with Narcissa Malfoy. She asked me to contact you on her behalf. I believe she is honest in the request she asked me to put before you. She believes her son will lose his life without fail should he attempt to enter the service of the Dark Lord. She did not tell me what ghastly happenstance might cause this, but she is utterly convinced of the outcome._

  
_She begs you to attempt to turn her son away from the fate of his father. As proof of her sincerity she has asked me to inform you that she believes one of your professors, Severous Snape, is a Deatheater. She admitted to me that she does not know how you can bring her son to see the evil in the Dark Lord, and to reform his thinking, but she tells me that if you cannot accomplish it that no one can. The concern that prevents her attempting the feat herself is that her son might take any word from her as a betrayal of his father and would immediately turn her in to the Dark Lord, thereby dooming them both._   
_I hope that you can help the child, and, through, him his mother._

  
_With my thanks,_   
_Diana Coeurdeleon_

 

Now that Cory had a bit of practice, she put flourishes on her previous effort. She worked an exploding star in the style of a firework as the opening letter, and the falling sparks, tumbling across the top and then drifting down both sides, revealing the text as the sparkling borders formed and the words vanishing as the drifting bright motes passed below them. The message would not repeat itself, the ink literally coming trump-activated by being read and trumping itself into an empty inkbottle on Cory’s desk at St. Mungo’s. She would know the moment it had been read.

  
“Dilys, would you do me a favor? Would you please ask Headmaster Dumbledore to send me an owl that I can recognize as his through you, so I can send him a private letter? It’s very important.”

  
“He says he will send Fawkes for it, his phoenix,” Dilys reported on her return.

  
Two hours later, a brilliant red bird with long scarlet feathers lit on Cory’s windowsill. The sun sparkled and glowed on the plumage, giving it the look of live coals. Cory stared at the phoenix for a long moment, then gave it her letter.

  
“Thank you,” she told it.

  
The phoenix cocked its head, examining her minutely, then leaped into flight and away.

  
Narcissa’s little white owl returned the next day with a new letter.

 

_Dear Diana,_

  
_Do not worry for me. Even with the power of the Malfoy name blunted, I am still Narcissa Black. Dumbledore contacted me via a portrait of my ancestor Nigellus Black. It had been in a storeroom, but on receiving your letter I though it politic to hang the ghastly thing in my private study. I took the liberty of removing the other paintings at his suggestion. GreatUncle Nigel has assured me that even if Dumbledore had refused to help me, he would help. As it happens, Dumbledore tells me that he will do all that he can for Draco. He did not mention you at all, of course, but pretended to simply be sounding me out as regards my personal loyalty to the Dark Lord. He said that since he had been instrumental in sending Lucius to Azcaban, he felt responsible for my welfare and Draco’s. It was very touching, and I think at least partly sincere. Still, I think he would not have taken the chance if he had not had your prompting. He is interested in you, and asked what my impression of you had been. I told him, with as much bite as I could manage, that you have what I have never possessed – courage._

  
_Draco is frighteningly bitter as regards Dumbledore and, of course, toward Harry Potter. For his whole life, he has heard Lucius speak of Harry’s potential, while finding only fault with Draco in the name of ‘helping him’. When he returns to Hogwarts, Draco is sure to fall even more deeply into the thrall of Professor Snape. Still, Dumbledore was somewhat reassuring. I must hope for the best._

  
_I have at last been contacted by my sister, Bellatrix. She is deep in the Dark Lord’s favor. She was very kind, concerned that I may have mistaken the Dementor’s attack as meant for me. I assured her that I had thought nothing of the kind, and said that the attempt on you was a very great gesture of the Dark Lord’s support of Lucius. I told her that my meeting with you had been to explore whether you were, indeed, a squib. Your ability with a card had, of course, been reported to the Dark Lord and his people. I think they are trying to decide what to do with you. I told them that you were initially poisoned attempting to escape from Nicholas Flammel’s custody, and that you are very angry toward those instrumental in your long imprisonment. I hope that it does not inconvenience you, but as long as they think you may be of use you will be safe. Be careful. They dare not approach you at Saint Mungo’s, but be assured that they will try._

  
_I believe they meant Bella’s visit to ascertain my own position as well as to gain information about you. Once it would have made me very pleased, but I could see plainly enough that it was only because of my news about you that they have bothered to approach me._

  
_I would not have credited that anyone could be so like Lucius, and yet so unlike, as you are. I cannot recall the last time anyone sent me flowers._

  
_Sincerely,_   
_Narcissa_

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

  
_It strikes me as very natural that Draco should seek out the only person he finds sympathetic at the school when he returns there. If you think it might help for me to attempt to strike up a friendship with your son, I will explore the possibility of relocating myself to some place near Hogwarts. There is a little village nearby, I understand, called Hogsmead. While it sounds less than urbane, I will look into the possibility of buying or renting a property there. Some of the country is quite picturesque, I am told, and I can always use the excuse of going there to paint on a day pass. If you have any advice, I would be glad for it._

  
_Your tale to Bellatrix was precisely what I would have wished. It keeps me a potential ally for them, but does not make me necessarily fond of Lucius. They’ll need to tread carefully, and that cannot but favor our own attempts. If we can tip them against Lucius, it might cool Draco’s ardor for the Dark. Of course it would not make Draco happy with me, but that can be sorted out later. Is it possible that they could be made to choose between Lucius, in prison, and myself?_

  
_Fondly,_   
_Diana_

 

_Dearest Diana,_

  
_I am speechless. Would you truly do this? It would surely fling you into the very heart of the coming war. I had no sooner written that last than I realized I am an idiot. I have already put you into the middle of things, and of course you will have to play it out._

  
_To answer your question, they would only choose you over Lucius if they could believe you had more use than he. His usefulness, of course, is blunted by having all his assets frozen and his political connections severed. I am sure they will attempt to remove him from Azkaban, but not when nor how. You will have to display some unique talent. Bellatrix was interested in your card use. I said nothing of your direct telepathic contact with me, but that would definitely interest them. Still, I think telepathy is a card (if you will pardon the usage) best kept in reserve. It is too valuable to play in an opening round._   
_They assume, correctly, that we are corresponding by owl, and by Goblin Parchment. If you would like me to burn your letters, do tell me, but as I seem to be the only one who can read them I’ve taken the liberty of keeping them. The artwork is so lovely it would be a shame to destroy it._

  
_Gratefully,_   
_Narcissa_

 

_Dear dense Narcissa,_

  
_While I have been accused on occasion of flippancy, I do not generally offer to fling myself into wars lightly. Of course I’m serious, and if I wanted to be shed of you I could be. As it happens, I have nothing but respect for your courage. Your son could be the most unpleasant young man in the world and still not rate destruction at the hands of a wizard so foul that no one will even name him. I realize that the lack of naming is supposed to be out of fear, which is really too bad. All the pseudonyms for him are so high and mighty. If it were from scorn to let so foul a name touch the tongue, I think he would have far less power. For example, speaking of him as Lord Moldywart would be so much less impressive for him. If power comes in names, let us grant him as little as possible over us._

  
_I contacted a solicitor about property near Hogsmead. He’s a greasy fellow, and I have no doubt he believes that he has an easy foreign mark on the line and has every intention of playing me along. The property he recommends overlooks Hogsmead and he describes it in ecstatic Victorian terms. I’ve learn from others that it’s called the Shrieking Shack and that it is one of the most haunted places in Britain. It has been on the market for almost a century. Still, I think I might like to own a haunted house._

  
_Feel free to keep my letters. I’m flattered you like my little drawings well enough to bother._

  
_Your port continues to be a great comfort. I hope someday we may be able to share a glass of beneath a more genial roof._

  
_Keep well,_   
_Diana_

 

 

_Dear Diana,_

  
_You are either the most generous woman alive, or a blithering idiot, and I should report you as quite mad if I were not so desperately grateful for your help. Draco has, of course, heard of you because of our meeting with the Dementor and one another. I told him that I suspect you of being his father’s sister, and that I believe you are not, as had been believed, a squib. Draco was startled, as might be expected. At this moment, he believes his father to be wronged and that the purging of muggle blood from Wizard bloodlines is a noble quest. And it is my fault, at least in part. In my youth I did not speak up for Sirius’ sympathy for muggles, because I couldn’t see that it would do anything but get me thrown out of the house too; and later in life I did not speak in agreement with Lucius. I ask myself now if silence is not the same as tacit agreement. I am sure that Draco has taken it that way._

  
_On more practical subjects, the Shrieking Shack is an awful place and has not been inhabited for at least a hundred years, certainly not since the original owners passed the veil. Surely there is something else, something genial, available?_

  
_Ever in your debt,_   
_Narcissa_

 

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

  
_Yes, I have heard the Shack described as a ‘unique fixer-upper opportunity’. On the up side, it is a little way out of town and so affords privacy that rural communities generally lack. Never fear, I shall make arrangements to stay in town until the thing can be properly renovated, but it is the only building for sale in anything like close proximity to Hogwarts..._

 

“Miss Cory, you have a guest,” interrupted the ward nurse happily.

  
“Wonderful,” Cory mumbled around her pen without any enthusiasm. She put the brush in her hand on a rest, and took the pen out of her mouth and laid it on the rest as well. She blew a bit of ink dry and closed her portfolio.

  
The wizard who slid into the room was tall, with long gray hair and beard. He wore purple robes and a collapsed pointy hat. Cory recognized him instantly from the Chocolate Frog cards she’d been collecting.

  
“Headmaster Dumbledore.” She stood up.

  
“Good morning, Miss Cordeleon.” Dumbledore smiled at her, an old man’s benign expression. With his tinkling blue eyes, it seemed designed to put her at her ease.

  
Bleys’ smile, she thought, and smiled back in half amusement.

  
“Nicholas told me that you're an exceptional artist,” he told her, turning his attention on the paintings, most unframed, that she had hung on her walls. “I assumed it was at least in part fond exaggeration. When I received your letter I began to realize how vastly I had underestimated you. You have my apology.”

  
Cory nodded acceptance. “Would you sit down, sir?” she invited.

  
“Oh. Yes, thank you.” He settled into the comfortably armchair that Cory thought of as a visitor’s chair. Jigger eyed their guest suspiciously, but crept onto the arm of Dumbledore’s chair. “What a charming little creature,” murmured the old man, stroking Jigger’s head. Jigger allowed the caress, then chirped in approval and leaped to Cory’s shoulder. “I suppose that what’s left is for me to ask you how committed you are to this course?” asked Dumbledore.

  
“Excuse me?”

  
“You are his mother’s friend, an outsider. He is not likely to listen to me or to any of mine. If he is to see the error of his father’s ways, Draco is going to need someone like you to help him.”

  
“And I’m going to do this in what way…?”

  
“You will need to be at Hogwarts, for one thing.”

  
“And I’m going to do this in what way?” she repeated, leaning back on the edge of her table with her hands and raising an eyebrow.

  
“Are you interested in a teaching position?”

  
“I’m interested in learning, but I’ve never been on the dishing out end of it. What would I teach?”

  
“Painting.”

  
“You’re joking, surely.”

  
“I have rarely seen paintings of this quality accomplished so quickly. You only went to Diagon Alley a week ago, and there are two paintings here either of which would qualify you as an instructor. May I ask how long you worked on the letter you sent?”

  
Cory shrugged. “I don’t know. Three hours? Five? Less than a night. I didn’t keep track… and the paintings are pretty for Dilys, but they aren’t really that good.”

  
“It may surprise you to know that there are very few wizard artists who could produce that letter at all. I don’t know of one who could do it in less than days,” he said mildly. “Illumination is a subject rarely taught and quite necessary in these times.”

  
“Any chance of getting some tutoring?”

  
“Is there something you’d like to learn? I might be able to arrange an apprenticeship,” he offered.

  
“Potions,” she said promptly.

  
“Why potions?”

  
She could feel his probe, subtle as a breath of air. If she hadn’t been concentrating already, keyed up, she would never have noticed it. Something about her suggestion had caught his caution. “Because it doesn’t take active spell casting. Because properly made ink and paint are potions, of a sort. Because I can drink magic, even if I can’t cast it.”

  
He nodded slowly. “I'll see what can be done.”

  
“I don’t know anything about your world. I don’t know that I can help, but by now I’m sure you know you’re risking the Demetors if you hire me.”  
Dumbledore smiled again, a slight expression this time. “I will see what I can do about your apprenticeship. You can expect an offer of employment in a few days.”

  
“We don’t even know that the Ministry will release me to Hogwarts. It’s a school, after all, and I do have a dangerous condition. Unless they trust you to keep me close confined.”

  
“After the Dementor attack, I think that there is nowhere that the Ministry would rather have you than at Hogwarts… I know that Saint Mungo’s would appreciate my offer; and if nothing else, Hogwarts has much larger grounds than St. Mungo’s.” His smile was warm and kind.

  
When he had gone, Cory finished her letter to Narcissa.

 

_I have just taken up my pen again after entertaining a most interesting guest. Albus Dumbledore wants to hire me to teach Illumination at Hogwarts itself. It might make Moldywart et al think I’m some kind of asset, and it will put me where their man at Hogwarts can keep an eye on me in addition to the access to Draco. It will also make them wary, I hope, of approaching me directly. If you’re asked, do please tell them that I have agreed to go to Hogwarts through my teeth because I feel I was not actually offered a choice._

  
_Keep your fingers crossed,_   
_Diana_

 

The next day, Fawlkes landed on her windowsill with a letter addressed to her. The seal was bright golden wax with a complex impression of four animals. Inside, the paper bore the letterhead of Hogwarts School with the seal repeated in full, brilliant color. A lion, a badger, an eagle, and a serpent divided the shield into quarters. Faulkes hopped in to perch on the back of her chair and warbled at her.

  
“Sorry, Faulkes, guess you’re waiting for an answer. I can admire the artwork some other time.” She read Dumbledore’s letter first.

 

_Dear Miss Cordeleon,_

  
_It is my great pleasure to offer you the position of Associate Professor of Illumination at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Though some of our staff choose to spend the summer holiday elsewhere, I invite you to take up residence as soon as possible in order to oversee the furnishing of your classroom and the ordering of any necessary supplies. Enclosed please find a proposed class list for your approval. We look forward to your arrival._

  
_Sincerely,_   
_Albus Dumbledore_   
_Headmaster_

 

Cory smiled and glanced at the class list. It was certainly comprehensive. All the classes were dependent on having enough students sign up, but several of them could probably be combined. Art wasn’t precisely a lecture topic, after all, and beginners could work in the same room as advanced students (assuming there were any) without trouble.

  
The second, smaller letter was sealed with green ink that smelled faintly of herbs. The seal itself was in the form of a serpent that matched one of the one on the Hogwarts crest. Inside, the serpent was repeated in silver on green as a crest at the top of the note.

 

_Miss Coeurdeleon,_

  
_Though it is not my habit to take on apprentices, I am willing to make an exception in your case. I shall conduct examinations immediately upon your arrival at Hogwarts so that I may have the opportunity of thoroughly assessing your abilities before the start of term._

  
_Severus Snape_   
_Potions Master_

 

Cory’s mouth hung open for a moment before she laughed ruefully. No wonder Dumbledore had wanted to know why she had picked potions.

  
“May we live in interesting times, eh Jigger?”

  
Jigger chattered at her, bouncing.

  
She sat down at her desk and wrote her replies, the first to Dumbledore, accepting the job and saying she’d be there as soon as she could arrange her discharge and travel. She requested that her classroom have, if possible, as much natural light as possible during class hours, and that it face north if that could be arranged. She asked for portfolios from students interested in applying for the upper level classes. She gave her letter to Fawlkes, stroking the bird’s chin with gentle fingers.

  
“Thank you, Fawlkes.”

  
When the phoenix had gone, she wrote one more letter to Narcissa Malfoy, using the peeling trumping ink trick. Again she used daffodils in the border and in Narcissa’s name.

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

  
_I have taken the position at Hogwarts and hope to leave Saint Mungos once and for all in a few days time. I also arranged a summer apprenticeship in potions, little realizing that it was Professor Snape who taught that subject. Still, it will be a chance to meet the man and perhaps to learn something about his relationship with Draco and with Dumbledore._

  
_Sincerely,_   
_Diana_

 

_Dearest Idiot,_

  
_You clearly know what a bad idea you are embarking on, or you wouldn’t have tried to justify it. I hope you would have drawn the unspeakably beautiful butterflies in any case. I’ve had quite enough guilt-inspired gifts in my time. I won’t tell you ‘don’t’, because I think you are the most reckless woman I have ever met. You would have given even Sirius a run for his money, and that man’s genius for trouble was the stuff of legend. What I will say is this - please be careful._

  
_Should you actually be able to renovate the Shrieking Shack, I insist upon being the first to receive an invitation to call. I’ve never been invited to a see anyone tilt at a windmill._

  
_Fondly,_   
_Narcissa_

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

  
_I am now up to my eyes in syllabi and course planning. Proposed are two levels of Calligraphy, three potential levels of Illumination, and Painting the same. Figure Study, Nature Study, and I am filling in as a professor in Ancient Runes while the actual teacher is on a year’s sabbatical. Far more frightening than Shrieking Shacks and possibly more frightening even than the vaunted Professor Snape. Have I mentioned that stubbornness has been noted as a part of my character once or twice?_

  
_I will send one of the school owls, or an anonymous postal owl, as soon as I have news of the house renovation for you. Since our correspondence makes you valuable to them, I plan to continue showering you with paper. In the name of tilting at the Shrieking Shack, I signed on the property yesterday. I think the solicitor almost fainted with relief. I will make a tour of the property when I get to Hogwarts, see whether its ghosts can be dealt with, and set out to find some very courageous renovators to give it an amiable air._

  
_More Soon,_   
_Cory_


	5. Strange Poison, pt 5 –  Schoolhouse Rock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Cory arrives at Hogwarts.

            The train hissed steam around Cory’s feet as she stepped down onto the platform at Hogsmead.  The hills around it loomed and swooped magnificently, and the wind carried a kiss of autumn chill. She paused to close her eyes and inhale in appreciation.

 “Professor Coeurdeleon?”  The woman was medium height and round, with practical hazel eyes under the brim of her semi-squashed hat. “I’m Pomona Sprout, Head of Hufflepuff House.  You’ll be staying in Hufflepuff while you’re at Hogwarts.”  Sprout had calluses, and a firm grip.  She glanced approvingly at the Poisontrap plant that Cory was hand carrying.  “It’s delightful to meet you.  Wonderful specimen,” she commented.  “Quite a rare thing in these climes.”

“Thank you, it was a gift.”

“Would you prefer to walk or to take the coach?”  She gestured toward a large coach drawn by some kind of reptilian horses with bat wings.

“What are those?” breathed Cory.

“The thestrals?  So you can see them, can you?”

“From your remark, I suppose that not everybody can.”

 “Only eyes that have seen death can see a thestral,” said Sprout in a soft voice.

Cory smiled sadly.  “Guess I put my foot in that, then.  Magnificent as they are, though, I’ve been on the train all day.  I believe I’d rather walk.”

“The coach will take up your luggage.”

They came around the end of the train station and Cory stared.  On the most prominent hill stood a structure that resembled nothing so much as Castle Amber.  Part absolutely defensible castle, with towers and wings in an amazingly graceful jumble.

“I felt quite the same the first time I saw it,” reminisced Sprout with satisfaction.

They started up the road together.

“You’ve got an old solarium on the north side as your classroom.  It’s just there, looking over the shade greenhouse.”  Sprout pointed to where a series of tall glass windows and a slanted glass part-roof stood out from the castle on the second floor.

“Solarium?  I hope these new classes didn’t put you out of space,” Cory said.

“Not a bit of it.  It’s a good room, but I’ve got plenty of space in the green houses.”

“Well I’d love to have some plants in the art room if you have any you’d like to put there.  They help the air in a studio, not to mention the atmosphere.”

“I think I can manage that,” Sprout agreed, looking pleased.

“Where is Hufflepuff House lodged?”

“It’s on the ground floor and below on the other side, near the dungeons so you’ll be close to the potions lab, and near the kitchens for midnight snacking,” said Sprout, eyes dancing with mischief.

 “That used to be one of my favorite pass-times,” admitted Cory.

 When they reached the castle, Sprout took her around one side of the great stair and down a staircase to a long hallway.  A portrait of a tall, severe witch nodded frostily to Sprout.

“This is Madam Briarway,” Sprout introduced the painting.  “Madam, this is Diana Coeurdeleon.  Crabgrass.”

The painting swung open.  The room guarded by Madam Briarway was half below ground level, but the whole of the southern wall was waist to ceiling windows, looking out over the sparkling lake.  Cory set the Poisontrap in the sunshine there.  Audrey’s leaves seemed to spread a little as if in pleasure.  The place was furnished as a pleasant sitting room with one end left bare for Cory to do with as she would.  Her easel and painting supplies were already there. The fireplace was unlit, but had a pile of logs laid ready in it.  A door open on Cory’s right showed a bedroom with a large canopied bed and a freestanding wardrobe. 

“Lovely,” Cory pronounced, smiling. She hadn’t expected teachers’ quarters to be so… homey.

“I’m glad you like it.  It’s a bit lonely down here in the summer season, with only Professor Snape for company.  I’m just across the hall behind the gardening woman, by the way.”

Jigger chose that moment to wake up from his nap.  He stretched against her hip and climbed part out of Cory’s pocket, assessed Sprout, and ascended to Cory’s shoulder.  He chirbled in question at Sprout.

“Good heavens,” said Sprout in brief surprise.  “What is that?”

Cory chuckled.  “Partly marmoset, and partly dragonfly.”

“Familiar or pet?”

“I’d like to think I’m familiar material,” Cory joked.

Sprout grinned.  “It will be good to have you here.  I’ll take you up to see your classroom now, and your office, then to Professor Dumbledore.”

Cory’s solarium classroom was amply supplied with light and air, and large cupboards along the east wall were filled with portable julian easels, each with its own supply box built in.  An antechamber was fitted out as an office.  On a table in the office were several bundles of post.  Cory didn’t waste Professor Sprout’s time with poking around.  She’d have time enough for that on her own.  The stair to the Headmaster’s office opened to the password ‘Chocolate Frogs’, and Professor Sprout left Cory there.

“I’ve a few things to tend to before supper,” she explained.

“I’ll see you there, I hope?”

“Indeed.  It’s good to meet you, Professor.  I look forward very much to your time here.”  Sprout shook hands warmly and bustled off.

Cory went up the slowly rising stairs and into the circular office of the Headmaster.  Fawkes sat on a golden perch.  He greeted Cory with a soft cry.  In his chair behind the broad desk, Dumbledore sat smiling.  The chair in front of the desk was occupied by a hook-nosed man in black.

“Ah, Professor Coeurdeleon, it is good to see you again.  This is Professor Severus Snape,” Dumbledore introduced them, eyes sparkling with mischief.  “Severus, your pupil.”

Snape rose.  Tall, angular face drawn and pale, wrapped in pristine black with fine, shoulder-length black hair that had enough wave to wrap itself into limp strands without managing to develop any real curl.  He needed either a ponytail band or a comb, and preferably both. 

Cory shook hands with Professor Snape.  He had long hands with a brief grip as if he didn’t wish to be touched. 

“An honor, sir.  I enjoyed your last series of articles in the ‘Brewer’s Vat’,” she told him.

“The Headmaster tells me that your study of Potions has been entirely theoretical,” said Snape in a dour baritone.

“I’m afraid that’s true, Professor.  If you don’t have time to babysit me, I fully understand.”

“Will you be wearing gloves during your studies?” asked Snape, distaste on ‘gloves’ and without the smallest flicker of hope or enthusiasm.

“I am given to understand that my condition may cause interaction with some substances.”

“We will begin working through the First Year potions tomorrow immediately following breakfast.”  He sounded as if he were facing slow death by torture.  “In the mean time, Headmaster…” he nodded to Dumbledore, and faintly more formally to Cory.  “Miss Coeurdeleon.” No ‘Professor’ ranking from him.

Cory nodded back and Professor Snape swirled out in a billow of black robes.  Weird.  Didn’t touch his hair, but the tunic and robe had been perfectly pressed, with a dozen buttons that she could see down the front, and five each on the cuffs.  Didn’t bother with his hair, did with his clothes.

“How did you find your rooms?” asked Dumbledore, gesturing to a chair as he proffered a bowl of candy.  “Lemon drop?”

“Yes, please,” Cory said, popping one into her mouth.  “Mm, those are very nice.  Everything in the classroom seems to be more than in order.  I brought the proposed syllabi for the classes you outlined,” she told him, taking the lists from her pocket and putting them on his desk.  “I hope the house elves know about my condition?”

“They and the staff are all fully informed.  Madam Pomfrey asked that you stop in the infirmary at your leisure to let her take a sample from you, in case an antidote is needed.”

“Of course.  There is one question I want to ask you before I begin, Headmaster.”

Dumbledore nodded encouragement.

“I know why I trust you, but why do you trust me?”

“For the same reason, I suspect.  Nicholas tells me that I can.” 

“If you have me here for a specific purpose, Headmaster, you really should tell me.  I’m remarkably stupid about some things, and I wouldn’t like to make any kind of error.”

The old wizard’s eyes sparkled.  “Minerva McGonagall is out for the month, as are Professor Sinistra and Madam Hooch, but you’ll meet the rest of the staff at supper this evening.  I took the liberty of sending word of the new class offerings to the students.  I believe you have some portfolios waiting in your office already?”

“I did note some packages there, and I will take this as my cue to let you get back to your own work.”  Cory rose, in deliberate copy of the way she’d once seen Aunt Flora do when someone had not answered a polite and necessary question.  Smiling, gracious, and Not. At. All. Pointed. “I’ll supply a list of supplies for the classroom as soon as I have time to go through the things properly.  Good afternoon, sir.”

Dumbledore’s smile grew and his eye-twinkle went up a notch. “Good afternoon, Professor, and welcome to Hogwarts.”

Unicorn's hooves, what an irritating man.


	6. Chapter 6 - Workin' for a Livin'

Severus Snape coughed slightly, waving smoke away from his face with one hand and replacing his wand with the other. “Miss Courdeleon. Do you think it is remotely possible you could manage this first year potion without blowing. something. up.”

“If I knew what was causing combustion, possibly,” Cory told him, looking at the melted cauldron with consternation. “Do you know what’s doing it?”

“If I did, I would assign you a yard of parchment on the subject,” he didn’t quite snap.

Cory held up both hands. It was her fifteenth minor disaster, after all. “Professor… if I knew what I was doing wrong, I’d do something differently. As it is…”

“Miss Courdeleon. Out of respect for the structural integrity of this dungeon, I fear we must call a halt to your experimentation. Neville Longbottom and Seamus Finnigan are less dangerous that you are,” he drawled, scorn heavy in his voice.

“I was going to say that perhaps you could help me with the more mundane chemistry of paint and ink. I’m good at paint, and not bad at ink, but I’ve no idea what’s in the paints and inks I’ve been using. I bought them at Flourish and Blotts, but I’d rather learn to make my own,” she proposed quickly. It would let her keep closer contact to him, and maybe to Narcissa’s son.

"If you insist," he said with the sigh of a man carrying the weight of the world.

In the mean time, she had her own classes to prepare for.  Beginning illumination classes filled without a need to audition, but Corey went through the portfolios for the higher level classes with care. She found eleven students with what seemed like real talent for the advanced classes.  Dean Thomas, 6th year Griffidor, was possibly the most talented artist of the bunch.  He was challenged for the title, however, by Sally-Ann Perks, a 5th year Hufflepuff.  She had missed last year entirely and was reapplying.  She had sent in a self-portrait that showed quiet, watching eyes and a sweetly round face.  Colin Creevy of Griffindor showed a real eye for composition, but needed drawing skills.  A Slytherin girl, Pansy Parkinson, had entirely prim, perfect drafting, but her work was as impersonal as a poor greeting card.  There were two notable Ravenclaw students, Morag MacDougal with a talent for motion and a real need to get it under control, and Luna Lovegood with an abstract so dreamily piercing that Cory made a note to put abstracts in her basic course syllabus. 

Cory wrote each student she accepted into her advanced classes personally, informing them of their acceptance.  The other applicants she placed in intermediate courses, with notes recommending which classes seemed, from the portfolios, to be where the students might find the best advancement for their skills.

A week after her arrival, when she had discharged the duty of assessing her students, Cory walked down to Hogsmead to see her new property, the infamous Shrieking Shack.  Ramshackle, overgrown, peeling paint… it was the quintessential haunted Victorian house.  The gate yielded grudgingly to the key the solicitor had given her. 

Cory picked her way up the overgrown path and climbed the rickety stairs onto the porch.  Like the garden gate, the front door yielded to its appointed key with groaning reluctance.  The paper was peeling on the walls, the floor was thick with dust, and the remnants of furniture lay broken and scattered in the corners.  By the end of the afternoon, she’d cleared the debris from the first floor, and stripped much of the old wallpaper.  She wrestled the boards off the windows, and noted with surprise that they were intact.  Not a single ghost appeared.  Nothing moved, banged, or even whimpered.

A trapdoor in the floor of the back library begged exploration, and revealed a tunnel beneath the house.  Cory left it for another day, concealed under one of the hideously bedraggled rugs.

Rosemerta, the proprietress of the Three Broomsticks, let Cory wash up in one of her guest rooms, then served her a hearty supper of roast lamb and potatoes with baked apples.  Rosemerta was intrigued to hear that ‘a town lady’ would tackle the Shrieking Shack, and by the end of the evening a crotchety old wizard had agreed to bring his three grown sons and begin trying to tame the garden.

“I’ll do the inside myself, but I have absolutely no experience with any kind of gardening,” Cory admitted.

“I recall before the h’aints come to it,” he told Cory.  “Used to do the garden as a lad.  Right fine, the house was.  Right fine.  Built a decade or so before the first Great War.  Old Ms. Rathbone took pride in’t house.  Never surprised me none a’tall that she’d shriek over the place going so down.”

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

_I’ve seen neither hide nor hair of ghosts at my Shack.  Gardeners are beginning work, but I’m loath to hire anyone to work inside the house.  I hoped never to scrub another floor, but I find my childhood skill disturbingly un-degraded._

_Professor Snape is very private, which I had expected, and quite thin skinned, which I hadn’t.  He’s also brilliant, acerbic, and as unpleasant as he can manage to make himself._

_My only attempt at society was to accept Professor Flitwick’s invitation to play chess.  He’s quite good.  Better, I confess, than I expected him to be; for which shame on me.  The game lasted for several afternoons.  We’re scheduled for a rematch beginning tomorrow.  Flitwick is certainly brilliant, but that can be a flaw as well.  He says both Minerva McGonnagal and Madam Hooch are bolder players than he is, so I am naturally curious for their returns._

_I hope both you and Draco are well and safe._

_Sincerely,_

_Diana_

_PS – Are you dying to know, yet?  Flitwick won. You see how clever I am?_

_Dearest and most brilliant Diana,_

_I have rarely waited on tenterhooks for a letter.  Yours is the only correspondence remaining to me that I do not dread._

_Bellatrix keeps coming to call, waiting for you to contact me.  Snape reported you hopeless, but your unreadable letters say otherwise. This has made me more valuable than before, since you write to me but no one else._

_I inquired whether Bellatrix’s patron would suffer a squib to pollute the ranks of the powerful, giving every indication of hope that your status would result in your death.  Bellatrix’s reply was ‘even squibs may be useful, for a while’.  I’m afraid for you.  You are within easy reach of Snape, and there is no one who would know more about how to poison you… or worse.  Do try to appear at least a little useful.  I would be most annoyed to lose so artistic a correspondent._

_My only callers besides Bellatrix are Aurors, most of whom find it necessary to wander about in the wine cellar knocking holes in the walls looking for things that any competent wizard could hide in far more clever places._

_Draco spends this summer actually studying, as our friends have abandoned him along with me.  He speaks of ‘joining the cause’ with all the savage ardor of disaffected youth._

_I’m sorry your house is such a ruin; but you were warned.  Naturally, I am burning with curiosity to see what you can do with the place.  The idea of you scrubbing a floor made an unlikely image.  I found it hard to imagine a Malfoy with bucket and brush on their knees like a house elf._

_Your illuminations are growing more and more lovely.  I have particularly enjoyed this last letter.  The little paperwhites peeping gradually out of the thicket of briars brought tears to my eyes.  I feel that cage of thorns all around me.  I hope I am as agile as your illuminations._

_Sincerely,_

_Narcissa_

 

 

_Dear Narcissa,_

_You chide me very gently for my slowness to write, and I deserved a far more stinging reproach.  Your last lines reminded me of a child’s story I read once, about a toy rabbit who became real.  It doesn’t happen, he was told, to those who are fragile, or who have sharp corners, or who are carefully kept.  You will grow through the thicket that surrounds you.  I have only to look at the sketch I made of you to see a stubborn nose and determined chin.  I am doing more sketches, though I will need you to model for the miniature I have in mind._

_Professor Snape had little light to shed on the matter of his students.  He warned me that Longbottom is dangerous unless watched like a hawk, Potter etc. are arrogant and scorn rules, and that the Slytherines are the only house with any discipline.  Surprisingly shallow.  Disappointingly shallow.  Suspiciously shallow.  I think his pride in Slytherin, or at least in Draco, is sincere.  He said to a conversational companion that it was ‘a shame, really, that she has no magical aptitude’.  A high compliment in a twisted way.  I suspect he is trying to interest others in me and to examine me through them.  Any compliment from Snape, even a backward one, draws attention here.  He certainly succeeded in getting Flitwick to play chess with me._

_I am under no illusion that I am freer of watchful eyes here than I was at St. Mungo’s.  Dumbledore wants something from my presence here, but he won’t say what.  He just twinkles at me as if the dancing blue eyes act was going to put me off.  He’s the most annoying man I’ve ever met, and I’ve dined some sterling examples._

_The Shrieking Shack proceeds at a mundane pace.  The upstairs is at least partly cleaned, and for all its creaking I don’t think the staircase is unsound.  The lower floor is beginning to look more under construction than condemned.  The odd thing is that the house seems basically sound.  The roof doesn’t leak, the floors are whole, and the windows are grimy but not broken.  It’s like a mocked-up haunted house, all ready for customers and perfectly safe.  I’ve slept in enough actually abandoned buildings in my youth to know the difference._

_While I am not actually convinced of my blood relation to the family, I assure you that scrubbing a floor is not only possible for a Malfoy, but would probably do Lucius good.  A little hard work might make him appreciate his servants and the muggles more... which gives me a good idea for detentions for recalcitrant students.  Studio floors are notoriously difficult to get clean.  Isn’t school supposed to build character?_

_Sincerely,_

_Diana_

 

 

_Dear Diana,_

_Your frustration with Dumbledore is understandable.  The man plays a charming old rogue to conceal a sharp mind.  I hope he has you there for your own good as well as his own. His loyalty is famous. He took in Severus Snape, of all people, and will not turn from the man.  Nicholas Flammel and he have been friends for a hundred years.  If Nicholas sets any store by you, and I can only assume he does since he went to such pains to get you to St. Mungo’s and save you, I am sure that Dumbledore intends you no actual harm.  Driving you into madness is an unfortunate side effect of his affection.  Think how that Potter child must feel after five years of the daft old fox.  I could almost pity the boy._

_Draco's life has changed so drastically, and I cannot help him.  Yesterday he had to be rescued by Aurors from children who attacked him in the street.  He is finding out for himself what it is like on the other side of the coin.  There is no hesitation in his hatred for those of mixed blood, no bottom yet to his belief in the superiority of the 'pure blooded'.  What can I do?  Can I save my son?  His life, possibly, but how can I save his poisoned heart when I myself have stood by and let it be twisted?_

_The Ministry will not, of course, give us any protection whatever.  At the same time, we live, as do you, beneath a bell jar of scrutiny.  I believe they know the temperature of my bath before I step into it._

_Bellatrix claims the Aurors are kept busy watching me by powerful allies within the Ministry of Magic so that the Dark Lord can operate more freely in other arenas.  Thus far they have not snatched up Belle, which she points to as proof of her claim.  I have no proof she is wrong, nor any that she is right.  I dread her visits more than the silence of the house.  Silence is, at least, not painful.  Seeing her too-bright look and the harsh edge in her voice… I remember when I would have done anything to try and please her, to try and win some small indication of approval, and I have only to look at Draco and think of Lucius for my heart to crack like glass brought from a furnace to a cold bath.  I have, I can see now, encouraged Draco over the years in his pursuit of his father's approval.  I have sought it myself._

_I’m told of a place in the mundane world where those of a certain religion can go to pour out their hurts.  You are become my wailing wall.  I considered tearing this up and rewriting it to render it less plain, but in the end I think I'll send it anyway.  I am tired of hiding, tired of lying, tired of always pleasing people.  I am so very tired.  This correspondence is my fondest possession,_

_Narcissa_

_PS – I opened and resealed this letter to include this post-script.  Lucius has escaped from Azkaban.  I do not know what to do other than to warn you and wait._


	7. Chapter 7 - White Rabbit

“Imobulis,” said a man’s voice casually.

Cory toppled over onto the new floor of her library. She tried to focus on the man’s voice in an attempt to keep her pulse from roaring in her ears. She would not panic. She would not. She couldn't afford it.

“It’s very irritating to find you still walking about, Cordelia, when I was quite certain you had ceased to be an embarrassment to the family,” drawled the man.  
He drew the curtain back a little, and the moon lit his face. Cory’s hair stood up on her neck. She wouldn’t have doubted for a moment that the man could have been her brother, or the brother of her shadow. With a word he released his spell. Cory scrambled back against a wall. He can’t touch my skin without poisoning himself. He can’t touch me. The thought helped slightly. Not much. He didn’t have to touch her to hurt her.

“Be stubborn if you choose, but a few more shrieks from the Shrieking Shack won’t draw any note at all. Why are you alive? How did they save you, all those years ago?”

Cory shook her head. “I don’t know.” 

“Predictable,” he sneered, though it seemed to be mostly to himself.

“Why are you here?” she whispered. “I don’t even remember you.” 

He turned back to her, smiled like shards of ice. “Ah, they erased your memory -- probably a simple Obliviate. What are you doing writing to my wife so regularly?"

"She approached me." ‘They’? Who in the name of the Unicorn’s teats were ‘they’? 

"Then I should ask you what she wants of you." He sounded so very, very bored. Which, if one knew Uncle Caine, one knew always to be a bad sign.

"She doesn't know much about me, I displayed a talent she hadn't expected, and by keeping in touch with me she can tell you and Moldywart about my movements."

"Why keep writing to her if you know this?"

Cory risked a bitter half smile. "Being a bridge to her makes me valuable to people who want to watch her. We have the same goal, for the moment - survival."

“Clever answer, but you never were stupid.”

“If you want to stay out of prison, you should leave,” she urged him quietly.

“Really.”

“If you are my brother, then for heaven’s sake, run. Dumbledore never would have brought me to Hogwarts without a reason. I assumed you were too clever for this."

Malfoy took a threatening step toward her, lip curled in anger. "Crucio."

White-hot, seering pain. She could hear herself screaming. She didn't know how much time passed before the pain stopped. It left her limp and panting, soaked in sweat. Her body twitched and shivered in the aftermath of the spell. "He’s drawn you out,” managed Cory thickly. 

Malfoy turned to the window, looking out again. 

Cory tried to see Jigger, but couldn't. What she saw when her eyes focused properly was the painting of Dilys in the sunroom, standing against the wall not four inches in front of her face. 

"I'm afraid I don't see anyone coming to save you," said Lucius, letting the curtain fall back over the window. "A drawback of living here, I expect." His tone carried deep satisfaction.

Jigger scrambled out from behind the painting and up onto the top edge. He screeched at Lucius and toppled the painting down onto Cory and the frame hit her in the ribs as he scrambled into the front of her robe. Without thinking, Cory crawled into the painting.  
***

Soft lips against hers retreated. That was too bad, it was the only nice thing in a world of this-is-what-a-beating-feels-like.

"Cordelia? Cordelia?!" Narcissa's anxious voice drifted past Cory’s aching joints and protesting muscles.

Cory really needed to stop doing this waking up thing. Or the being knocked unconscious thing. One of the two simply had to stop. " 'm all yait..." Cory slurred.

"Oh yes, quite all right, I can see that!" snapped Narcissa. "Merlin's balls, what IS this all over you?"

"Hmp?" Cory dragged her eyes open and looked at one hand, covered in colors. "Pain'..?" Ow. She let her hand drop. "Pain...T." Her eyes focused slowly further out, on Narcissa.

Narcissa's beautiful face was bruised and swollen on one side, and she cradled her right arm against her body.

Cory forced enunciation in a hiss, rage battling with the howling pain of her joints. "Lucash..."

"He used Crucio on you?"

Cory made a vaguely affirmative noise. " 'R you alrigh'..." 

"I will be... you I'm not so sure about," Narcissa managed to sound bossy even with her left eye swelling shut.

That probably shouldn't be an attractive quality, but it was downright adorable. Trying to smile hurt. This was a dressing room, and Cory was probably ruining this very pink oriental carpet. The window showed only darkness. It must be night. Jigger huddled anxiously on Narcissa's shoulder, a sorry sight his golden fur matted in green and gray and brown smeared together. He was ruining that silk robe, and Narcissa didn't seem to notice. "Soww...r-r-ry." Cory’s teeth were beginning to chatter. Cold. She was so cold. "How'd gesh here..."

"Granda Phineas found you in a *painting*, you idiot! What do you think you were doing?" Narcissa scolded fiercely. 

"She can't stay here, Grandear." A crisp, male voice. "Lucius is coming."

"I'm going to Grimmaulde Place. Tell Dumbledore."

"Draco..." began the portrait.

"I'm not six, Granda Phineas! Oh Merlin, he's here... tell Dumbledore!"

Scrabbling of glass and bottles. Crashing. And then someone rudely tried to jerk Cory's aching spine out through her navel and they crashed onto a marble floor. 

A woman's voice carried heavy disapproval – "Narcissa Black, rise from that unbecoming position at once!"

The ceiling, Cordelia noted dizzily, was made with elaborately embossed copper sheets.

"Cordelia? Cordelia, talk to me." Narcissa leaned over Cory, stroking the sticking wisps of hair off her face.

"Whrr aw'we?" whispered Cory hoarsely.

"In my aunt's house." Narcissa drew Cordelia's head into her lap with her good arm. "Dumbledore made it Unplottable, but my portkey was made long before he did that. I didn't need to know where I was going, just let the spell take us."

Cordelia was sure she should object to lying with her head in Narcissa's lap. She should be getting Narcissa medical attention, but the other woman's hand stroking her hair was soothing; and Cory was tired... so very, very tired. A stair creaked, off to Cory's right and above them. 

"Imobulis"

Cordelia snapped over to her knees, shoving Narcissa down under her. The muscles in her hips and thighs burned. She caught sight of a gaunt man standing on the stairs, wand in hand, before the bolt caught her squarely in the chest and she toppled over for the second time in two hours. She watched the floor come up at her and just had time to think – "Oh damn." before it hit her in the head.


	8. Welcome to the Hotel California

The second day after a beating was, in fact, pretty bad; but some thoughtful person had put a cool cloth on her forehead. Probably the same person who was holding her hand. It was familiar. Comforting. Protective. Poisoning themselves. They shouldn’t be holding her hand. Cory wedged open her dry, gritty eyes, blinking to get them to focus. 

Narcissa was beside her in a rather worn, tattered four poster bed, propped up by pillows and fast asleep, with one hand holding Cory’s and the other with a finger in a book fallen onto her lap. 

Cory winced as she tried to disentangle her fingers from Narcissa’s. Her joints were swollen and bruised from the torture curse that Lucius had used on her.

Narcissa blinked and sat up, giving Cory a reassuring smile. “It’s all right,” she soothed. Her face was spectacularly bruised and swollen, but she could get her left eye partly open.

“Poisonous…”

“I know. I had to take a truly revolting potion.” Narcissa got up to her knees to help Cory sit up, ignoring the hiss of discomfort, arranging pillows behind her.

“Who was the man on the stairs..?” Cory's head thundered as if she'd been drinking with Uncles Random and Gerard, and her tongue felt thick and stupid.

“His name is Remus Lupin. Part of this mad little crew of dissidents. He was fired from Hogwarts last year because people very sensibly didn’t want a werewolf teaching their children. I gather they’ve got a very stout cage around here somewhere,” said Narcissa dryly.

Cory raised an eyebrow, and tried not to regret it. “Dumbledore hired him, though? He must’ve had a reason.”

“I’ve met werewolves,” said Narcissa, coldly. “I admit, in the Dark Lord’s employ,” she added with a faint lift of shoulder when Cory’s eyebrow didn’t twitch, and admitted: “Lupin didn’t offer any violence when I dropped my wand, and he did call for help.” She took a glass of water from the bedside stand and helped Cory take a drink.

Cory gave Narcissa’s fingers as much of a gentle squeeze as her own swollen joints could bear. “Start at the part where my head hit the floor?”

“I put up my hands and dropped the port key. He let us surrender, and after some arguing he called Dumbledore, who brought Severus, who made a potion for me that tasted like the back end of a diseased boggart. They said stay in here with you, because your poisonous nature was now part of my cure. Let’s not bring anyone else into this, my darling, all right?” teased Narcissa, bending close and batting her eyelashes.

Cory chuckled in spite of herself. “You were the one who went for mouth to mouth. And thank you for that, by the way. Every joint I have hurts like hell, but it’s nice not to be dead.”

“Mmm.” Narcissa grinned and sat up again.

“Have you talked to Draco?”

She sobered. “Yes. He’s extremely upset, but I think he’s on my side of things. I spoke to him at Hogwarts while Madam Pomfrey repaired my wrist. That and the bruises were convincing,” she said, her smile bitter and brittle.

“And she didn’t gave you antivenom?”

Narcissa drew back entirely, leaning against the cushions. “No, Severus did that. You’d… better talk to him.” 

What the hell. Cory struggled up a bit higher among her pillows. “I’d rather hear it from you.”

“He said it was the same potion he gave you, but he used your poison in it, from a sample of your saliva. He says that as long as I stay near you, I’ll be fine. As your poison purges from your system, I’ll be weaned off it naturally.” She put her book on the side table, and crossed her arms as if in defense. “Until then, I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.”

“Are you… okay with that..?” asked Cory slowly.

“I am. It's far safer than going home, for example. I hope you won't mind?” Narcissa’s tightly crossed arms didn’t budge, but her eyes shone with almost-tears. She kept them fixed on the worn Victorian wallpaper across from the foot of the bed.

Cory’s heart contracted painfully. It hurt to see Narcissa look like that, and she didn’t even know why. “Narcissa, don’t look like that. You saved my life, and you’re the only real friend I’ve got,” managed Cory. She reached out to thread her fingers into Narcissa’s. 

“You need to get out more,” said Narcissa, acerbic and fragile.

“I’ll introduce you to all your son’s teachers. They’re an, ah, eccentric bunch; but they’re nice if you let them be. You may have to LET them be nice to you,” Cory warned, a bit of a grin creeping around the edges of her mouth. She tipped her head, sucking air a little, to make Narcissa meet her gaze.

“You’re very charming when I’ve no other options. Don’t make me push your forehead, it’ll hurt and I don’t want it to.” Narcissa met Cory’s eye to poke Cory’s forehead lightly with her free hand. “And Severus?” she asked, face smoothing out of fearful defensiveness.

“He saved me, saved you. There’s something there we’re not seeing, I think. Dumbledore reminds me of my guardian a bit. Nick loves knowing what nobody else does. I don’t know what’s going on at Hogwarts, but I want to find out.”

“Dumbledore is like Nicholas Flamel? So you were that poor Potter child?” Narcissa searched Cory’s face. “Eleven and rescued from under the stairs?”

Cory leaned back against the pillows. “I was on the streets. A grand, glorious city with as seedy a waterfront as you please. I don’t even know how I got there. He caught me picking the pocket of his date.” It was her turn to look out over the foot of the bed. “He should’ve turned me in. He looked at me, and for a whole three seconds I could swear he was shocked.” She huffed a half laugh. Flat-footed wasn’t a usual look on Bleys. “He told his date he’d see her later, and took me in. Just like that. Like adopting a half-wild, scruffy, hissing spitting kitten.”

“How old were you?” asked Narcissa softly.

“Fifteen, sixteen max? Nobody's quite sure. I’d been on the street for more than a year. Maybe as much as two. I don't know quite how long.”

“How… did you get there?” Narcissa’s voice was squeezed and tight.

“No idea. I don’t remember anything before I came too in a fireplace in an abandoned building. Things are patchy for a while. ‘Probably a simple obliviate’, Lucius said. Which means it wasn’t him. I know about the wizarding world. None of it’s strange at all. I just don’t have any memory of it. Nicholas did his not-inconsiderable best to help. So did others.” Well, except Random. Random had gotten her 'inappropriately' drunk. It hadn’t helped her memory, but it’d gotten the exceedingly too-short story out of her. And then basically everyone who had any kind of mad idea of how to help her had taken a run at trying to help 'Bleys' project'. 

“And you really don’t remember anything at all before that..?”

A terrible notion came to Cory’s mind, and she managed to rearrange herself to look at Narcissa, pale and taught as a gut string on a harp. “You called me Cordelia.”

Narcissa blinked. “I don’t think so?”

“I’m sure you did. But I’ve signed all my letters ‘Diana’.”

“Well, Lucius called you Cordelia. That was his sister’s name, after all, and you do look like her.” Narcissa shook off Cory’s grip, picked up the cloth that had fallen off Cory’s forehead, and retrieved her wand from the side table to cast a spell that rechilled it. She laid it over Cory’s eyes, the smoothing of her hands tipping Cory’s head back against the pillows. “Go back to sleep. I dare say you’ll meet everyone in the morning.”

Cory wanted to argue, but lying still felt good and the cloth was cool and she just didn’t have the energy.


	9. Ironic

A person could only sleep so much. Damn. Cory was stiff and sore, and her arm was asleep from Narcissa lying on it. Sometime in the night, Narcissa had cuddled up. Probably her body’s attempt to get its dose of poison. Cordelia eased her arm out from under Narcissa, who made a kitten-grumbling sound and resettled. There were still circles under the poor woman’s eyes from exhaustion, so Cory hunted in the closet until she found a green and silver bathrobe to put on, pulled on her gloves from the side table, and put on the thick socks that lay with them. She crept silently out of the bedroom. She’d made it most of the way down the stairs when a crotchety voice made her jump and whip around to put her back to the wall.

“Who are you?” The house elf looked as if it had been put through a wringer. Or deflated. Everything about it was wizened and decaying. Rather like the house.

Cory put her hand over her heart and tried to will it to slow down. “I’m Diana Coeurdeleon. Cory,” she offered. “Who’re you?”

“Miss Cissy is all right?” The awful little creature glared at her.

“She’s fine. She’s sleeping, is all. I didn’t want to wake her, but I wanted a cup of coffee. I thought I’d go down to the kitchen for it.” ‘Miss Cissy’. The poor thing had a pet name for Narcissa? “She’ll be fine. What’s your name?”

“Kreacher.” Abruptly the house elf looked around nervously. “Kreacher must go back to work at Hogwarts. He is not supposed to be here, but Kreacher had to know about Miss Cissy.”

“Maybe Narcissa and I will see you there, later.”

The elf vanished.

The worn man who’d knocked Cory out came into the hall far enough to see her from somewhere down the lower hall. “I see you’re up. How are you?”

“Like I’ve been worked over by a profession a couple of days ago or so? I could use a pain killer and a cup of coffee?” she suggested. “I’m Cory, by the way. Diana Coeurdeleon.”

He grinned slightly. “I’m Remus Lupin. I can help with both pain killer and coffee. Right this way... Cordelia.”

Cory rolled her eyes and hobbled the rest of the way down the stairs. “Is that what Narcissa told you?”

“That’s what my eyes tell me, too.”

“Did you know Cordelia Malfoy?” She frowned. Should she know him?

“No, she never came to Hogwarts. The family didn’t let her out of their manor grounds, I’m told. It’s that you do, I fear, look very like Lucius.” His face was calm, collected, sad. “Him, I’ve met. He was part of the attack that killed my best friend.”

“Sirius Black. It was in the papers. I’m very sorry.”

“So am I.”

“How is his godson taking it?”

“As well as can be expected. He’s trapped at his muggle aunt’s for the summer, poor lad.” Lupin took down a pair of coffee mugs.

“Did they really keep him under the stairs?”

“Afraid they did, though now he’s got a proper room. I expect he got too tall for the cupboard. Who told you?”

“Narcissa. I don’t know how she heard about it. Oh coffeeee…” she half-purred as Lupin passed her a mug, inhaling in bliss and sipping

Lupin managed a slight smile, and handed her a pain potion. “Courtesy of Severus.”

Cory took a deep breath, remembering too well the rotten-hooves taste from St. Mungos. She swallowed the potion down, then blinked at only faint bitterness. “That was… not awful. I don’t think it’ll catch on as an after dinner drink, but not bad at all.”

“He’s a right git sometimes, but no one can say Severus has no skill at his profession.”

She grinned. “Poor man, he tried to be patient with me almost blowing up his dungeon twice a day for a week.”

“Hard to imagine him patient. He isn’t with his students.”

“Triiiiied,” emphasized Cory, and won a smile from Lupin. He was really not a bad-looking man when he smiled. “So, um… what’s behind the curtain in the front hall?”

“A portrait of Walburgia Black. Sirius’ awful mother. Nobody can get it off the wall, and when she can see us she screams about blood traitors and mudbloods in her house.”

“Was she that way when she was alive?”

Lupin shrugged and leaned against the counter. “So I’m told. She burned his name off the family tree as a blood traitor. She spends most of her time screaming about blood traitors and mudbloods in her house.”

Cory grimaced. “Sounds like a charmer.”

“The vast majority of the Black family are unstable. Mrs. Malfoy seems to have avoided it, much as we are on opposite sides of the coming war.”

“I think you’ll find she’s on her own side, and on Draco’s side,” said Cory with the driest smile she could borrow from Fiona. She lowered herself into a chair with a wince. “I suspect that if they thought they could do so in safety, you’d find a lot of the old families are on their own side. Moldywart doesn’t sound much saner than Walburgia, and that’s not a grand trait for a leader.”

Water started upstairs. Narcissa must be up.

“I don’t suppose you’ve seen my clothes?”

“They’re hanging in the upstairs bath. If you want to wash up and get dressed, you can be back at Hogwarts in time for breakfast. I’m sure Draco will want to see his mother again as soon as possible.”

“Is Draco really okay?” asked Cory. “Are we sure he’s loyal to his mother instead of his father?”

“We don’t know yet. He certainly idolizes his father. I’m sure he thinks Dumbledore’s a fool to put him in Severus’ care.”

Narcissa’s voice called, “Cordelia! Be a darling and bring me a cup of coffee?”

“Blood traitors! In my house! Get out!” screamed a woman’s voice.

“Walburgia,” said Lupin helpfully through the din as he rose.

“Shut UP, Aunt Walburgia!” Narcissa’s voice barked. “If you can’t be polite I’ll have Cordelia paint you a ball gag!”

The portrait sputtered and went silent.

Lupin’s eyebrows shot up. “Coffee on its way with my thanks, Mrs. Malfoy,” he called. He got another mug, freshened Cory’s coffee while he was pouring.

“You’re a star,” Cory proclaimed him, earning a quiet laugh, and went upstairs.

Narcissa was already in the tub, a gigantic Victorian affair with ball and claw feet. The water was still running, and the bubbles rising around her slender shoulders smelled pleasantly of jasmine. There was a stool standing by the tub, and Cory put down Narcissa’s coffee.

“Don’t go,” Narcissa bade her when she started to turn and leave. “It’s plenty big enough for two.”

“Uuuuuuhhhh…” Cory managed.

“You’re not getting into clean robes in that state,” commanded Narcissa, “and we need to get to Hogwarts before Draco gets twitchy and does something we’ll all regret. Come on, it’s not as if you can poison me.”

Cheeks hot, Cory turned her back and shed her clothes.

“Oh my goodness, is that modesty?” Narcissa teased a little, but she was sipping her coffee as if she hadn’t a care in the world when Cory climbed hastily into the tub.

In spite of her embarrassment, Cory groaned with pleasure as she settled into the hot water.

Narcissa’s face lit in a smile, blue eyes warm and crinkling slightly at the corners.

The smile, so simple, struck Cory through like a dazzling bolt and drove her breath out. She managed a helpless smile.

“What?” asked Narcissa, still smiling, puzzled.

“It’s just nice to see you not actively terrified,” Cory covered with a firmer smile. She reached for her coffee to cover. “So, what are you going to do with yourself at Hogwarts? Surely you’ll be bored to tears if all you do is sit around all day without some project?”

“I’m just contemplating that, actually. I did wonder if I could persuade Dumbledore to let me teach some small extras. Etiquette, perhaps, and comportment.”

Cory laughed. “Comportment? Isn’t that a little… old fashioned?”

“It needn’t be. Imagine how much better the Potter child and his m… friend would have come off during the Tri-Wizard Tournament if he’d had the slightest idea how to give an interview. It’s not that we don’t need people to destroy the Dark Lord, but if we could appeal to the old family Witches and Wizards who, like me, are in with him out of fear for our families or for purely practical reasons of self-preservation… altruism is all well and good, but self-interest is an excellent motivator.”

“I’m not sure how that goes with comportment, though.”

“We must persuade those who are unfamiliar with our world that it isn’t all fussy old manners for no reason, and we must persuade those who are longtime members that an influx of new ideas brings added benefit. That Umbridge creature from the Ministry did untold damage to those children, including to my son by encouraging him to be like his father…” A shadow crossed Narcissa’s lovely face. “There must be some way to reclaim those children and give them some way to connect to one another. They’ll need it.” She set down her cup and stood to rinse off the bubbles. She was like a water nymph, all pale and slender and glistening.

Cory gulped down the last of her coffee. Unicorn’s hooves, get a hold of yourself, she lectured internally. She’d been a late teen around a dozen of the arguably most beautiful people in Reality, after all. And Narcissa was married to possibly, arguably it was probable, Cory’s brother. She shook her head hard and got herself rinsed.

Narcissa had charmed her only clothes clean, and Cory’s hung already clean on the back of the door. Cory sat down wrapped in the tatty robe to dry her hair.

“Merlin, we’ll be here all morning,” said Narcissa, and lifted her wand.

Cory’s scream ripped out as her mind blanked. Abruptly she was on the floor. She couldn’t remember getting there. She couldn’t catch her breath, as if the scream had stolen it all. Her mouth babbled without her having any control over it, high and terrified. “Don’t! Don’t make me forget…” Cory snapped her teeth together, bit her own tongue, and wrapped her arms around herself, shaking as if she were palsied.

Narcissa’s wand skittered on the tiles as she half-dove to scoop Cory into her arms.  “I’m sorry, darling, I’m sorry. It’s all right, I won’t cast anything. It’s all right,” she murmured.

Cory clutched Narcissa’s damp shoulders, trying without success to make her lungs work.

“Ladies?!” Remus Lupin’s voice through the door was concerned.

“We need a calming potion, quick!” Narcissa called at him. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered into Cory’s hair. “I should’ve thought. I’m sorry.” Narcissa’s cultured calm broke on the last word.

Cory could only hang onto her, mind reeling. “This is so st-stupid,” she managed to stutter, panting. “I d-don’t DO th-this…” Some detached part of her brain understood this was a panic attack, which was stupid because Cory had been in hand to hand bloody COMBAT and never had so much as a twitch; but she couldn’t make that rational spark big enough to overcome the shaking.

“Cordelia, drink this.” Lupin’s voice was kind and his hands steady. He tipped a potion down her throat.

Almost immediately, Cory’s chest relaxed, and she gulped in air. Gradually she got herself under control, breathing deep, trying to force her thundering pulse down.

“What in the name of Merlin caused this?” asked Lupin.

“It’s my fault. The last two times anyone cast at her, one was Cruciatus, and the other was you stunning her. I was going to charm her hair dry. I should’ve thought about it,” Narcissa told him, voice schooled and calm, hand stroking Cory’s damp hair gently.

Lupin sighed. “Understandable. How are you, now, Miss Couerdeleon?”

“I’m fine. Just embarrassed.” Cory forced out a trickle of a laugh. She untangled herself from Narcissa, but didn’t resist when the other woman steadied her as she stood up. Falling down wouldn’t help the embarrassment. “Thanks, both of you. Guess I’ll just let it dry down,” she joked.   

“As soon as you’re dressed we can go get breakfast.” Lupin closed the door as he stepped back out into the hall.

Cory pulled on her robes with a reassuring smile for Narcissa. What in the leaping name of the Unicorn had happened? She hadn’t cowered and frozen when Lupin had pointed a wand at her and Narcissa. What babbling bullshit was it that Lucas and Lupin had fucking attacked her, but a hair drying spell reduced her to some kind of flashback hell? It was ridiculous. Worse, she didn't even know what the stupid reaction was about. The Obliviate cast on her seemed the most obvious. It was frustrating she hadn't let herself continue the sentence, in retrospect. "Narcissa, remind me when we're settled at Hogwarts - I have a really, really bad idea."


End file.
